The Fellowship Café
by Kyonkichi9
Summary: In the campus of Middle-Earth University lies the Fellowship Café, the famous coffee and Legolas's delicious vegan friendly (who knew?) baked goods. Owned by none other than Gandalf the Grey, the café is the employment place of many of the students, and the greatest place to get a rather decent cup of coffee to get students through the misery of University.
1. Slow Day and You Better Tip Me Well

**The Fellowship's Café **

The rain drearily poured down, dripping down the large front windows of the coffee shop Aragorn was currently trapped in. He did not mind his job in the slightest, but when it rained, business took a sharp turn to the worse, because it gave all of the students of Middle-Earth University an excuse or reason to actually do their course work.

There were a few people who risked their laptops in the rain, and were currently sipping coffee and typing rapidly. Occasionally, they would wave over a waiter and ask for another coffee, adding to the pile of cups that Pippin kept on forgetting to clear. Aragorn thought that this one girl, who was constantly sipping coffee, was going to die of caffeine overdose. He then wondered if they would be legally responsible if she did die. He would ask Merry about that later.

He casually, noncommittally wiped the counter, as he had been doing for the past couple of hours, exempting the times when he actually had to accept his fellow student's money in order for them to have another fresh dose of caffeine. When the girl waved her hand at Pippin for a refill, Aragorn was severely considering cutting her off, less a nationwide lawsuit will occur and the whole university would have to go into mourning.

"And one of those gluten free butter tarts, please," Aragorn overheard her order, and Pippin nodded, putting the money in his pouch and going to retrieve the order.

"She wants another coffee?" Aragorn whispered as Pippin got behind the counter and began to fix up the order.

"No, double shot espresso with whipped cream, sprinkled with some cinnamon," Pip recited, "And a gluten free butter tart, which is quite understandable because those things are really good. I should ask Legolas for the recipe..."

"Do you think she'd be able to survive that amount of caffeine?" Aragorn asked as Pippin handed him the money she used to pay for it. Aragorn opened the register, and put in the cash as Pippin started to carefully sprinkle a smiley face onto the whipped cream with cinnamon.

"Probably," Pippin admitted, though when they both looked up she was shaking so hard that she was having a hard time typing normally. "Do you think if she dies, we'll be held responsible?"

"I don't know."

"Gotta ask Merry about that," Pippin concluded as he swept the tray with the espresso and butter tart off of the counter and walked over to the girl. "Here's your order, mam."

"Thank you," she said to him, as she grasped the espresso and took a long drink of it. Aragorn watched as Pippin tried, and failed, to shuffle away from the girl without looking like he was horrified at her addiction. That was pretty rich, Aragorn thought, seeing as Pippin was severely addicted to nicotine and relied on nicotine patches to get him through the day.

"Slow day, huh?" Pippin said, leaning against the counter, that Aragorn had spent the previous hour polishing. "I considered calling Boromir to tell him that he shouldn't come in today, but I figured he'd need the money, and I wanted him to be as bored as we were."

"I am sure he'd appreciate that," Aragorn snorted as Pippin straightened up when a hand came flying into the air. For a second, Aragorn was very scared that it was going to be the girl, but it happened to be the couple in the corner; Aragorn's customers. "Well, duty calls."

"When you come back, we're making a betting pool on how many coffees this girl can have before she loses consciousness," Pippin called to Aragorn, only loud enough for the tall, dark haired politics student to hear him. Aragorn received the couple's, who, in his opinion were a bit to lovey-dovey and cuddly for students who were supposed to be working, order and went to the counter to fill it out.

Aragorn had just finished with the chai tea mocha and French vanilla cappuccino with a side of two doughnuts, when the bell rang out signalling another customer. When Aragorn looked up, he saw that it wasn't a customer, in fact, but instead their fellow co-worker, Boromir. The man, who was just a couple of centimetres shorter than Aragorn, was completely drenched with rain, holding a rather broken looking umbrella in his hand.

Aragorn set down the tray of food for the couple-y couple, and then went back to the counter, where Pippin was waiting for him.

"She asked for _another _coffee," Pippin muttered to himself, "I'm betting five more and she's dead."

"I think it will take four," Aragorn hissed back as Boromir walked behind the counter and made for the 'STAFF ONLY' door.

"Sorry for being late," Boromir said as he got into hearing range, "I nearly got hit by a transport. It broke my umbrella, damned thing." Boromir proceeded to grumble under his breath like he was an elderly man as he entered the changing room.

Just as Boromir disappeared, the coffee-girl raised her hand again, and Pippin groaned to himself. Aragorn thought that perhaps he should talk to the manager and owner of the store about having a cut-off point to the amount of caffeine they were allowed to serve one customer in a time frame.

When Pippin came back, he was grumbling very much like Boromir had been. Aragorn caught the words "better tip me well," and "considering not calling an ambulance when she " as Pippin fixed a coffee and returned to the girl.

Aragorn got back to polishing his spot on the counter when Legolas made his half-hourly round to refill the baked goods sales items. Legolas was balancing two trays of various cookies as he entered, and Aragorn caught a glimpse of Gimli, the only other staff member that worked in making anything other than coffee apart from Legolas.

Legolas gave Aragorn a small smile as he assorted the cookies and other pastry goods into their proper places. Once they were all finished, Legolas adjusted his hair net, and then smirked largely at his dark-haired friend, "Looks like the Regular is coming."

There were many regulars to the Fellowship Café, but there was only one that all of the staff members called _the _Regular. Aragorn subconsciously began to fidget with his hair and his uniform's apron. Boromir had taken to wiping a different section of the counter as Aragorn had been, but when he saw Aragorn, he sighed.

"Have you finally grown enough balls to serve her, or am I going to have to do it?" Boromir demanded as the bell tinkled. Aragorn looked at his friend for a second, before he grabbed a cloth, and furiously began to clean the glass display of the cookies, looking out of the corner of his eye at the woman who had just entered.

She was smiling as she entered the usually busy café, as she walked over to the counter, "Hello. Seems like a slow day," she said, though Aragorn was not entirely sure who she was speaking to. It couldn't have been him, or maybe it had been. Aragorn was incredibly confused when it came to Arwen and girls in general.

"It really is," Pippin replied, "The usual, Arwen?"

"Of course, Pip," she said with a large smile. Aragorn could hear his heart pounding in his ears. Damn, she was extra pretty when she smiled. He was beginning to wonder if anybody else could hear his heart beating, because Boromir was looking at Aragorn like Aragorn was going to have a heart attack or something. Arwen then examined the baked goods, staring through the glass directly across from Aragorn.

Aragorn wasn't sure when he stopped breathing, but he knew that it had happened because he suddenly felt the urge to inhale sharply. Arwen didn't seem to notice, when she said, "How are the pumpkin muffins?"

"They're a creation of Legolas's, so they're vegan, but they're actually really good," Pippin told her, "fresh batch just came out a couple of minutes ago."

"I'll take one," Arwen decided, straightening up. It gave Aragorn an excuse to move away from the counter and go into the back on a 'bathroom' break AKA a 'Holy crap I have no idea how I'm supposed to make this crush less obvious than it already is please send up' break. He tried to ignore the smug smirk on Boromir's face as Aragorn passed him.

When Aragorn emerged from the bathroom, Pippin and Boromir were on Pippin's phone, googling the symptoms of caffeine overdose. Aragorn looked around to see that Arwen was indeed gone, and breathed a sigh of relief. He then walked over to his friends in time to hear a rather disappointed sigh from Pippin.

"Well, if she has sixty three more cups of coffee, it'll kill her," Boromir told him, sounding slightly hopeful. Pippin gave a low groan.

"She'll never drink _that_ much!" Pippin whined, and then his face turned into one of absolute horror. "What if she comes back? What if she's addicted to our coffee and comes back every day?"

"It couldn't be as awkward as when Arwen walks into the café," Boromir grumbled as he put his phone into his pocket. Aragorn felt his cheeks go red, "Just tell her you like her already. The sexual tension is making me uncomfortable."

"She's the daughter of the most successful doctor in Middle-Earth, there's no way that she'll ever fall for me," Aragorn said miserably, putting his heads in his hands and slumping down on the counter. Pippin reached out and patted him on the shoulder.

"That sucks, man," Pippin said sincerely, "Ah dangit! She wants something else. I swear the only profit we'll make today is from this girl," Pippin groaned as he left behind the counter and put on a fake smile for the caffeine addicted woman sitting behind her laptop. Aragorn gave a small snort as Boromir picked up a cloth and began to wipe the counter clean despite the fact that there was nothing on the counter to clean.

Aragorn watched as the couple-y couple from the corner of the store giggled about something, and then packed up the laptop they were sharing (for work? For watching Youtube by sapping up the café's free wifi?) and left the café. Aragorn got up from his slumping and went to go clean up the mugs.

He hoped there would be a tip. He needed something like that to get through the next couple of hours of his shift. Either that or at least have the girl overdose on caffeine. Maybe if she did, he'd be able to get out of work early.

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**This came to me when I was reading a café centred Hobbit fanfic, and I decided that since I haven't found a LOTR one, I'd make one myself. **

**Thank you for reading, and please review!**


	2. Law (Prelaw) Student and White Envelope

Merry, as a law, well, prelaw and eventually law, student was extremely busy all of the time. It didn't help that his parents hadn't expected his existence so they hadn't made a savings account for him and didn't think to make one when he showed up. With his meagre job in high school, he had been able to afford his first year of university before he had to seek out a job in order to afford his post-secondary schooling.

So, as a refined, intelligent, punctual law (prelaw) student, he found that the only job he could receive was one in the campus coffee shop that his cousin worked in already. It wasn't that Merry disliked his job. It was a cozy little joint, and one of its walls had been replaced with an entirely filled bookshelf instead, which greatly pleased Merry. The people there were pleasant too, and it gave him a feeling that the café had been running for a long enough time to get a reputation around campus.

Merry checked to see if the road was clear before he made to cross to the café. As much course work he had, he needed this shift anyways, because he had run out of food money yesterday, and only had a can of diced tomatoes left. Hopefully Mr. Gandalf would understand and pay him ahead of time.

When Merry entered, he saw that Frodo, Sam and Gimli were currently waiting on large amount of customers inside the café. Merry looked around and couldn't find a wall plug without a laptop charger plugged in, and a table without a student working on something and having a nice coffee.

As Merry entered the change room, Pippin exited it, grumbling something about how he had too much course work to have to wait on this amount of customers. Merry sighed; his cousin had picked up the unhealthy habit of mumbling under his breath from Boromir, and it looked like it wasn't going to end anytime soon. Not that he really minded Boromir, though the older man had a foul temper (at best), he was still enjoyable to be around when he was happy, and was a great help when it came to study tips and tricks.

Merry changed quickly, no longer fumbling with his bowtie as he used to, and then got out to see that at least five hands were in the air. He sighed, tying his apron around his waist and ensuring that there was no hole in the money pouch in it before he went over to the nearest customer.

"Hello, how can I help you?" Merry recited, pulling out a pen and a notepad, seeing as there were five people huddled at the table. The group of students looked at him, all of them with tired, stressed out faces that Merry was sure he would have if he had to resort to going to a café to finish his course work. Not that he was allowed to vocally judge them; that'd probably get him fired.

"I'll have two jasmine teas. No cream, no sugar," the first girl said. He tried to keep the concern off of his face when he realized that this girl was ordering both of these teas for herself, since everybody else made their own orders for caffeinated beverages. When Merry left, they all spontaneously burst out into laughter. At a joke, he hoped, not at anything that they found humorous about him.

It took a little while for Merry to complete the order, due to the fact that there was six drinks, twelve sides of baked goods (some of it vegan, some of it Gimli's "not pansy, real food"*). After he handed out the beverages, and the food, and tallied up the money to make sure it was the right amount, he gave them a smile, before he turned to leave.

He was stopped, however, by the tea girl. She didn't really acknowledge him, but instead just said, "Is the tall, grey eyed guy coming in to work today?"

"I'm sorry by which tall, grey-eyed guy are you referring to?" Merry retorted, thinking of either Boromir or Aragorn. Both were tall, and grey eyed, both coming from the city of Gondor where that was the stereotype. The only way Merry could tell the difference between the two men from a distance was that Boromir's shoulders were broader than Aragorn's were.

"The broad shouldered one," she specified.

"I'm not sure," Merry told her, but he mentally kept it in his mind that this girl was obviously pining for Boromir. He almost started chuckling as he walked away, knowing that it was really a lost cause. Boromir had no interest in girls. Boromir was more interested in politics; something that they all teased him about all of the time.

Merry was still smiling when he got back to the counter, though as he got there, he saw that Frodo was not. Pippin was bustling around, making drinks, his sleeves rolled up to show an obvious nicotine patch on the inside of his right wrist. Merry frowned at his cousin; not that he could control the chestnut haired man on his life choices, Merry was still very much against for his cousin to wear them at work.

Instead of scolding Pippin, Merry turned his attention to Frodo, "What's wrong, Frodo?"

"Some girl asked me for my name... and then asked me if I was related to Bilbo," Frodo groaned softly, as he played around with the golden ring on his finger.

"Don't tell me... she asked if you could-" Merry couldn't even finish his sentence when Frodo cut him off.

"Yup," Frodo said, "She asked for an autograph."

"Ohhhh," Merry's winced at his friend. Frodo nodded solemnly, sighing heavily, before he began to go over to the help the next group of people who put up their hand. Merry shook his head at Frodo, feeling incredibly lucky that Bilbo was only distantly related to him, and not his direct Uncle/guardian as he was to Frodo.

Deciding that having Sam, Frodo, Gimli and Pippin were all decent enough waiters for the crowd that had gathered in the store, Merry went to go tackle the growing amount of dishes looming over the small sink in the back. How Gandalf had accumulated the large amount of mugs was a mystery to Merry, but living to be seventy-four probably had something to do with it.

Merry smiled as he washed off the 'Visit Newly Embellished Erebor!' mug, enjoying the Scottish runes over the handle. He was partly certain that he mugs were partly the reason why so many people came to the Fellowship Café. Often, regulars would request mugs to drink out of, and if they came often enough, the mugs were usually set on standby until they arrived. Just as the 'Jobs of the Rangers of the North' mug was always left out for Arwen, who found the cup amusing.

A pile of dishes later, he heard Pippin groan to himself as he went back to work the espresso machine. Pippin, who had picked up the rather nasty habit of mumbling under his breath from Boromir, was muttering a full out rant to himself, not seeming to care if he sounded like he needed mental help. Merry, who loved Boromir to death (in a completely heterosexual way), put it on his mental list to scold Boromir about infecting his cousin.

"She's back. I can't believe she's back," Pippin was grumbling, "I cannot believe it. We're gonna run out of coffee if she keeps on coming. I'll have to remind Gandalf to buy some more."

"Who's back?" Merry asked, setting down a cup, which Pippin angrily grasped and dried off with a towel before he began to make the coffee.

"The caffeine girl!" Pippin said, "The one we were betting on dying of caffeine overdose, the one I asked you about," Pip added. Merry raised his eyebrows at his cousin in a sceptical manner.

"Invite me to your wedding," Merry said sarcastically, "And we probably would be held responsible if she died, so don't go killing her."

"I'm not going to get married to her!" Pippin told him angrily, messing up the cinnamon smile, and sighing to himself. "Have fun with the dishes," Pippin said haughtily, before he grabbed a gluten free butter tart and put it on the side of the plate, before he blew his cousin a kiss, and whirled out back into the eating section of the café.

Merry rolled his eyes, but snorted as he drained the sink, and towelled down his hands. It was getting close to his break, and he was hoping that he would be able to find Gandalf to talk about the fact that he needed his pay check ahead of time. Merry was worried, seeing as it would be the fourth time he had asked since his employment.

Merry began to put away the dishes, setting the mugs up on the emptying shelf. As a shorter man, Merry generally did not do this, leaving the task to Aragorn or Boromir, or Legolas whenever the blonde decided to venture out of the kitchen. But since most of the waiting staff currently at work was shorter than 180 centimetres, and Gimli, who was currently busy waiting on a table of six, was the tallest of the bunch currently working.

Merry had filled the full shelf, when Gandalf appeared out of the 'STAFF ONLY' door. The old man, who had a wispy, white beard, and twinkling blue eyes, smiled at the young employee before he gestured for Merry to come over. Merry stared at his boss wide-eyed, praying that he was not about to receive a pink slip. He wondered what the café-goers would think if he fell to his knees and grovelled at Gandalf's feet, begging to keep his job.

"It is not a very important manner, Meriadoc-" (no matter how he tried, Merry could not get Gandalf to call him by his nickname), "You do not need to look at me with such fear-filled eyes."

Merry gave his boss a small nod, "What is it, then?"

Gandalf pulled out a white envelope, addressed in curly handwriting as '_Meriadoc Brandybuck.' _"I was thinking that you would need this."

Merry accepted the envelope, and opened it to see that it had is pay check (in cash, as Gandalf always paid them with). Merry counted the bills, and then frowned at his boss, "There is more than I had earned." Most would not have mentioned it, but Merry was a law (prelaw) student, and wanted to be an honest man in life.

"Oh. I just thought that perhaps if I added a bit more, it would last you until your next scheduled pay check," Gandalf simply replied, a smile stretched out on his face.

"Thank you, sir, I really do appreciate it," Merry told him, a sense of relief working its way into his chest. He gave Gandalf a large smile, before he put the bills back into the envelope, and stuck it in his pocket.

"Thank you, Meriadoc, for being my employee," Gandalf said back, "I do believe you have ten more minutes on your break? Don't you suppose you could help me decide on which kinds of fireworks I should use for the Halloween showing?"

"Oh, of course," Merry grinned at Gandalf, and then allowed his ten minutes of his break to be filled with the thought that he, perhaps, had one of the greatest employers in the world.

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*No offense to vegans; I just figured that Gimli, who is a human in this story and a major carnivore (as I imagined dwarves to be) would think that Legolas's life choice of veganism would make give him a reason to tease him. I don't hate vegans, and neither does Gimli, it's just something he likes to tease Legolas about because they are bros.

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**Thanks to KFinance, somebunny, XxJigoku-no-HanaxX, Nirette, and mngirl for reviewing! Thanks to ****XxJigoku-no-HanaxX, Poppinbottlea, ichipup, and Nirette for favouriting/subscribing to this story! Thanks for reading, and please review for feedback!**

**This update's question: Who do YOU think the caffeine girl is?**

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**Thanks to my friend Rachel for being completely awesome and helping me with this story. Couldn't do it without you~**


	3. An Uncle's Shadow and A Present

As much as Frodo loved his uncle Bilbo, sometimes he hated him. Bilbo was a wonderful guardian; Frodo had more fond memories with his uncle than he did with his parents, seeing as he could hardly even remember what his mother's face looked like. If it weren't for the photos, and Bilbo's stories of her, Frodo wouldn't remember her at all. Bilbo understood that Frodo would never be his own son, and Frodo loved Bilbo for that.

It wasn't so much of the person Bilbo was that made Frodo dislike him, but more of what Bilbo had done as a career that made Frodo squirm inside. Frodo did not dislike Bilbo for being a successful novelist, writing a very well-known novel about a dragon, some dwarves and a personally made-up creature called a hobbit that Bilbo would always deny was him. Frodo did not dislike Bilbo for becoming the very popular movie director for said novel. Frodo just hated the fact that Bilbo was doing exactly what Frodo wanted to do for a living.

Bilbo fully supported Frodo, paying for his post-secondary schooling, and telling Frodo that he needn't worry about being unsuccessful because Bilbo knew that Frodo would be a wonderful novelist (and if Frodo wasn't, Bilbo's fortune could keep him going, but Bilbo never said that). What Bilbo didn't realize was the shadow that he was casting over his poor, beloved nephew.

Though Frodo took pride in being related to Bilbo, he was thinking of not tell people his real name when they asked. He had made the mistake enough, and every single time it was by a fan of Bilbo who recognized him from the outtakes of the movie, even though it had been years ago when Frodo had his daycare onset of a very popular movie franchise. Every time he was asked, and every time he gave them his real name, the person would always ask, "Can you get Bilbo's autograph for me?"

At which Frodo would reply with, "I'll see," and then would never bother to ask Bilbo for an autographed piece of paper.

The only reason why Frodo was working at the café to begin with was because he was researching for his own books. He felt that personal experience was the only way to be able to write a scene properly, and despite the fact that he didn't need money, he wanted to know the experience of working.

Frodo soon realized that the place he got hired at was not like most places young adults got hired. Frodo _enjoyed _his job since day one, and he realized that this was an obvious exception to most jobs. But, since he enjoyed the job very much, he didn't want to quit it, especially since some of his friends from his home town were working there too.

The day was busy, as was most when it was a crisp fall day, and Frodo had little break between serving the bustling tables. He had yet to be recognized by some die-hard Bilbo Baggins fan, so his mood had not been destroyed.

Merry was working along with him, picking up as many shifts as the law (prelaw) student could in order to stay alive. Frodo had once offered that Merry take the money he earned from working, but Merry, who had a large sense of pride, denied him. That still did not prevent Frodo from dropping off large tips on the tables that Merry had served when Frodo thought that Merry wasn't looking.

Frodo was serving a table near the door when the bell jangled, and a girl with bushy blonde hair came in. She scanned the café for a couple of seconds, before a smile lit up on her face, and she made for the counter. Frodo walked back behind her, going behind the counter to make the desired drinks for the table he had just served. He could not help but overhear the conversation between Boromir and the girl.

"Oh, hello Eowyn , how are you?"

"I'm well, and before you ask, so is Eomer. Nice place you've got yourself hired here," she commented, "I'll take a chocolate chip muffin."

"No coffee?" Boromir asked.

"I don't have time, I have to go to my co-op in at the vet's," Eowyn told him, "Thanks for offering though. I'll get one next time I come. How's Faramir?"

"He's doing pretty well. He loves his courses," Boromir replied. "That'll be three-fifty."

Frodo had finished making his drinks and had left from behind the counter as Eowyn searched through a small purse to pull out the money. She was out of the café before Frodo returned to the counter.

"Friend of yours?" Frodo asked Boromir as the older man closed the register. Boromir gave Frodo a nod.

"My brother's pining for her. It's pathetic and adorable at the same time," Boromir gave a small chuckle. "Oh crap, my table's calling for more. Could you man the register for a couple of seconds as I handle this?"

"Sure," Frodo replied as Boromir bustled out of the way. Frodo wondered how a man so tall and so broad could even fit behind the register because even he was cramped. He watched as Sam came through the front door, his blonde curls a mess. Frodo smiled at his childhood friend, who gave him a grin back, before he disappeared behind the 'STAFF ONLY' doors to change into his uniform.

Aragorn was muttering under his breath as he came out from the kitchens with a tray of cookies. Frodo thought that he must have been assisting Legolas by taking out the goods that the blonde vegan was mass producing since there were so many customers. Aragorn gave Frodo a nod, though his mind seemed elsewhere, and he seemed to be muttering study notes under his breath.

As Aragorn was putting in the cookies, the bell rang again, and the _Regular _walked in. Frodo had to smile at his co-worker when he saw that Aragorn's ears had turned red. Aragorn practically dumped the cookies into their respective places, before he rushed back to the kitchen, almost tripping before he got there. Merry, who was currently working the espresso maker, sniggered under his breath as Frodo took Arwen's order.

"Oh, and Frodo-" Arwen was all familiar with their names since she came so often, "Could you give Aragorn this? I hear he has a midterm soon. Tell him I saw good luck."

Frodo took the small present, wrapped up with a small ribbon, and exchanged it with the coffee and the gingersnap cookies Arwen had ordered. Frodo smiled, "Of course, Arwen. Have a nice day."

"You too, Frodo," Arwen smiled back at him, before she turned and left. When Arwen left, Boromir, who had returned to the counter with a large list of food and drink to retrieve, broke down in laughter. Merry was joining him, snorting as the espresso machine gave a small click to symbolize that it was done making the coffee.

Sam looked incredibly confused when he walked out, but then immediately saw the present, and made the connection. "Don't you laugh at them. It's hard to tell the person you like that you like them."

Merry gave a small cough that sounded suspiciously like "Rosie", causing colour to rise up in Sam's face.

"Get back to work," Frodo told them, and Merry gave a small sigh. Frodo gave Boromir back his position behind the register, and then went into the kitchens to give Aragorn his present. When Frodo entered, Legolas was scolding Aragorn.

"If you want her to like you, you actually have to _talk _to her you know," Legolas was saying as he poured some muffin mix into a pan. Frodo, who had very little love experience, or interest, even had to agree with Legolas.

"Aragorn... she left you a present," Frodo said, watching as Aragorn's face turned red. Frodo handed Aragorn the present, before he turned and left, the smirk incredibly noticeable on his face. He hoped he hadn't looked too smug when handing Aragorn, but then again, Frodo's smugness could not have even gotten close enough to the smug smile on Legolas's face.

When Frodo exited, he was cornered by Boromir, "On a scale of one to ten, how red was Aragorn's face?"

"Over nine thousand," Frodo responded, and Boromir gave a chuckle before he went to go serve the new group of girls that had entered the café. Frodo saw that there were multiple hands raised up in the air, and he sighed. Gandalf really needed to get more employees other than just the nine of them, especially around the time of midterms.

Midterms meant that most of the employees had to study, and it also meant that everybody else on campus took to the café to study. Frodo had no idea how they were supposed to concentrate with the music dimly playing in the background hidden mostly by the constant chatter of the young adults in the room. Frodo liked to be in his dorm room when he studied, alone, quiet and without any distractions. But then again, the coffee was much easier to access here than it would be in the dorms.

Frodo looked at the desperate faces of the students, books piled around them as they attempted to remember what they had learned. Some of them looked as if they hadn't slept in days, and that coffee was the only thing that kept them up. Frodo understood their feelings, unlike Merry who was opposed to any sort of addicting substance, because Frodo relied on coffee to get him up in the morning. He didn't, however, rely on it to keep him up until the next morning.

If there was one thing Frodo was grateful about having Bilbo, a very busy (and famous) novelist and director as an uncle, it was that Bilbo had taught him to manage his time well enough. But Frodo was also grateful that few other people learned how to do that, because if they hadn't, the Fellowship Café would not be as popular as it was today.

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**Thanks to Rorythedragon, tommyginger, LotR-HP-PJ, Jasperslittlesister, Gracie, mngirl, Snowy, KFinance, ErynWa, wonderpanda10, XxJigoku-no-HanaxX, Adanwen, and yellowtulip88 for reviewing! Thanks to Charlieandcie, LotR-HP-PJ, Rorythedragon, wonderpanda10, Nyla Evergale, Neversmile, Dangerous Redhead, Adanwen, and yellowtulip88 for favouriting/subscribing! **

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**Thank you all for reading and please review!**

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	4. Side Swept and Advice

Sometimes, Boromir felt as though death was out to get him, in the literal sense. Whatever he had done in his past life, he was certainly paying for it now. In the past month, he could recall three near-death experiences, and he was hoping that he'd make it to Halloween alive. He just kept on telling himself that he had made it this far, and that maybe he could do something to redeem his past life's horrible karma.

He was a good friend; he had helped Pippin study for his midterm, and he had gone to watch all of Eomer's home games and would cheer especially loudly whenever the Rohan native would score a point. He watched Eowyn's soccer games whenever she asked him, and even hauled Faramir along most of the time so his younger brother could drool over how awesome of a soccer player Eowyn was. Hell, he even went to watch Eomer's equestrian competitions. He would think that being such a good friend would make his bad luck go away.

No, of course it wouldn't.

Being a good friend did not control the weather, nor did it control the large trucks that drove down by the university. Though it had not been raining at the time of Boromir's departure from his dorm to the café, and though it did not start raining in the time it took him to walk to the café, Boromir still arrived at the busy café completely soaked. He hated the fact that puddles took so long to dry, and he despised the fact that that one truck driver happened to enjoy going through puddles.

Aragorn, who had been waiting the table closest to the door, gave a snort as he cleared away the crumb-filled plates and the near empty coffee mugs. Boromir glared back, and then shot at him, "Try having a date with soap sometime soon, Aragorn. If your hair got greasier, you could supply McDonalds."

Aragorn had taken a shower the night before. Boromir would know, because he lived in the same dorm room as Aragorn, but it was still a running joke between the two. Aragorn had naturally greasy hair, and if he spent more than a day without a shower, it began to show. Boromir had taken to teasing Aragorn about it, and Aragorn had taken to teasing Boromir about his horn-shaped keychain on his backpack.

"If your backpack got any hornier, I'd think it'd be gay for you," Aragorn shot back, and even Boromir had to give a small laugh, chuckling the whole way to the 'STAFF ONLY' door.

He changed quickly, using the hand drier to make his hair look somewhat presentable before he went out to work. He still looked like he had woken up on the wrong side of the bed, but Boromir was getting to be pretty sure that he had no _right _side of the bed to get up on.

When he exited the change room and entered the café, he saw that there was a large crowd of girls around the glass cabinet holding the baked items. He could hear them whispering about how pretty Legolas, who was currently stocking up the baked items. Legolas gave a small groan, only loud enough for Boromir to hear as he turned and escaped into the kitchen.

Boromir then began to think that having Legolas as a waiter would probably bring in quite a lot more customers. Though, looking out at the packed tables, Boromir figured that there were enough customers as it were. He saw a hand fly up, and went to go help them with their order.

The girl's eyes widened as she saw him, and she immediately looked down and began to mutter things under her breath. Her friends made it incredibly obvious that the girl liked Boromir in the like _like _fashion. Boromir got all of their orders, and gave the girl a small smile, "And you?"

She blushed heavily, before she muttered in a slight German accent, "Um... one green tea...please..."

"Of course," Boromir replied, before he whisked away. He heard the girl's friends laughing as he went back to the counter and began to make the requested drinks. Pippin was working the espresso machine, and gave Boromir a large smirk.

"Are you going to ask her out?" Pippin demanded.

"What?"

"That girl; she totally likes you," Pippin said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, "And she's really pretty. You should go for it. I don't think I've ever heard you speak of a girlfriend."

"That's because I've never had one, and I don't want one," Boromir told him as he finished steeping the tea. If Pippin's eyebrows rose any higher, they would go off of his forehead and start tap dancing on his head.

"Are you gay?" Pippin asked, and Boromir almost spilled the tea he was currently making.

"I am about as gay as Legolas is straight," Boromir told Pippin firmly.

From the kitchens, there was a loud, "JUST BECAUSE I BAKE, DOES NOT MEAN I AM GAY, I DO HAVE A GIRLFRIEND, YOU KNOW!" from Legolas, causing Boromir, Aragorn and Pippin to start snorting into the drinks they were making.

"Fine, I am about as gay as Gandalf is straight," Boromir reworded, a chuckle in his voice. He was rewarded with a small chuckle, from Gandalf no less, who had come to see what all of the yelling had been about. Boromir gave a sheepish smile to his employer, but Gandalf merely waved him off. It was incredibly obvious that Gandalf was indeed a homosexual* since he had a husband.

Once Gandalf had disappeared into his office, Pippin whispered, "Why don't you want a girlfriend?"

"They seem like a lot of work, and I don't really have the time to deal with one," Boromir admitted, and Pippin broke almost into hysterics at how sincere Boromir's tone had been. Boromir, however, just rolled his eyes and went back to the table to serve the drinks he had made.

The girl was still a blushing mess when he turned around and Boromir hadn't the heart to tell her that he wasn't interested. He had seen how crestfallen his brother had looked every time Eowyn didn't acknowledge his presence, and Boromir didn't want to break the girl's, whose name he didn't even know, heart. He tried not to feel guilty as he saw that she had left him an incredibly large tip when her group of friends left.

It was the fifth hour in Boromir's eight-hour shift (he often got those on Tuesdays since he had no classes then), when his younger brother walked in. Faramir had just started off in university, and was doing relatively well in his courses. Boromir was incredibly proud of his younger brother, despite the fact that his father seemed to be spiteful about the fact that Faramir had not chosen to go into politics like Denethor, and Boromir, had.

Boromir did not mind that Faramir wanted to be a teacher, particularly an English teacher for high school students Though Boromir never really cared about the metaphorical resonance in the countless novels, poems and short stories that Faramir read, Boromir loved how passionate his brother was about it, and enjoyed just letting Faramir talk on and on about it.

"Hello, stranger, how can I help you?" Boromir asked, and Faramir gave a small snort.

"I was hoping that I could find my brother, but instead I wander upon his doppelgänger. Is there any possible way for me to speak to my brother?" Faramir responded.

"Let me check in the back," Boromir told him before he turned and disappeared behind the 'STAFF ONLY' door. He waited a couple of seconds before he walked back into the café. Faramir had taken up a seat, and already had a coffee. Pippin, who was in the dying minutes of his shift, was talking to Faramir.

"I'm sorry," Boromir said to Faramir, "I could not find Boromir back there. Can I leave a message?"

Faramir rolled his eyes, and Pippin looked at Boromir as if he thought the older man was somewhat insane, before the clock ticked, and Pippin slowly inched into the change room to get to his class.

"So, what did you want to talk about?" Boromir asked. Faramir took a sip of his coffee, and had a nervous look in his eye. Boromir immediately knew that he was going to be talking about Eowyn. "Eowyn's next in-town soccer game is in two weeks. Do you want to come see it with me?"

"Yes," Faramir said bluntly, before he gave a sigh, "Boromir, how do I make her like me?"

Boromir stared at his little brother. Boromir, the man who had never had a girlfriend and was not planning to have one anytime soon; Boromir, who had no romantic experience apart from the chick flicks he had been dragged to by his mother when he was younger; Boromir, who hadn't picked up a single romance novel in his life, now had to give his brother romantic advice. He supposed that 'I don't know' wasn't a sufficient answer.

"Talk about what you like," Boromir said what first came to mind. It was what he liked to see when talking to a person, and he thought that it made his brother seem like a much more interesting person.

"But she's a _soccer _player, Boromir! She can't possibly like novels, and English, and teaching," Faramir said exasperatedly. "Maybe I'm just doting upon the wrong girl."

"Hey, you never know, Faramir. She wants to become a veterinarian, maybe she has a love of books, too, but never has the opportunity to talk about them," Boromir shrugged, "And you are definitely not doting upon the wrong girl, Faramir. She'll come around eventually."

"You sure?" Faramir looked at his brother before he took a sip of his coffee.

"Have I ever lied to you?" Boromir responded.

"Yes," Faramir retorted without a second's pause.

"About what?" Boromir demanded.

"You told me that I would die if I cracked my knuckles twenty times in my life," Faramir recalled, and Boromir gave a small laugh.

"Okay, maybe I did lie to you about that, but I wouldn't lie to you about something like this," Boromir replied, "Trust me, Faramir, she'll see you for what you are and she'll love you."

Faramir could only smile at his older brother, before Boromir saw a hand flash in the air.

"Well, duty calls," Boromir told Faramir, "Enjoy your coffee, and don't you dare forget about the plans we made for Eowyn's soccer game."

"Of course not," Faramir smiled, before he finished his coffee and made to leave. Boromir smiled at his brother's retreating back and hoped to whatever was holy that Eowyn would like his little brother in return, because Boromir had no wise words of wisdom to help his brother if his heart got broken.

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*Since Ian McKellen is a homosexual, I decided that Gandalf should be too, seeing as this is modern day. Also, I live in Canada, so people of the same sex can marry.

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**Thanks to KFinance, Gracie, mngirl, Nyla Evergale, Guest, and Xx-Jigoku-no-Hana-xX for reviewing! Thanks to katnor, RaphaelGirl14, Bellanee chan, Red Pen Ninja, and Singing Moon for favouriting/subscribing!**

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**Sorry for such a late update. I was going to finish this earlier, but I had a lot of school work, and a field hockey tournament at which I got a concussion and found that looking at screens made my head hur****t.**

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**Question: Who do you think Gandalf's husband is?**


	5. Lecture Halls and Smiles

**Note; I received a review telling me that my decision to make Gandalf gay was one that I should rethink. I do respect your opinion, but heed mine. I chose to make my character gay, but people who are gay do not get to choose whether they are gay. I thank you for your concern about other people reading about homosexuality, but I do believe that anybody on this site can choose what they deem appropriate and inappropriate. Gandalf's sexuality plays little part in this story, but if you are not comfortable with it in the slightest, you don't have to read my story. **

**Thank you for reading this message, and now, to the story.**

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Sam sighed to himself from the back of his lecture hall. Professor Treebeard's (his real last name was Ent but nobody called him that) lectures weren't boring, per se, in fact, Sam enjoyed his lectures the most. No, Sam was sighing because he had the most perfect view of the back of Rosie Cotton's head, and she had no idea that he even existed. Her watched as she moved to stifle the laughter from the joke that her friend must have told her. Sam felt his heart sink when he realized that he would probably never be able to make her laugh like that.

He tried not to get into a vicious cycle of moping, as he often did in Professor Treebeard's class. Perhaps that was the reason why this class was the worst one out of all of his classes. He tried to blame it on the fact that he worked in the café, but he really knew it was because he was acting like a love-sick puppy and watching Rosie Cotton the entire lectures instead of taking notes. He could always copy off of the notes that Legolas had kept from when he went through the same classes as Sam. The course material really hadn't changed _that _much in three years.

He began to doodle on the paper, not really caring as Prof. Treebeard rambled on about forestry and how it had been done so inappropriately for so many years. The aged man spoke incredibly slowly, and though what he said was interesting, it was just a pain to have to wait to listen to it. So, Sam justified his not paying attention to the fact that Legolas's notes were just as accurate, and a lot easier to understand (Prof Treebeard often made some syllables too long, and marred his words).

The lecture concluded when they were dismissed, though Sam didn't realize he could go until he heard the shuffling of textbooks against desks and the chatter of his fellow environmental science peers rise up from the usually silent lecture hall. Sam gathered his books slowly, taking advantage of the clatter to watch as Rosie gave another giggle as she eased her way out of the aisle and to the door.

Sam had slung his bag over his shoulder when he heard a loud, somewhat obnoxious voice, "Rose babe, you wanna go to the club with me tonight? We could have a little fun."

The suggestive tone to the voice made Sam want to go punch whoever had said it in the face. Sam looked up to see a dark haired boy smiling at Rosie, his hand slung over his shoulder. It pleased Sam immensely to see that Rosie looked incredibly uncomfortable with the contact.

"Sorry, Daniel... it's kind of... well, a Tuesday," Rosie said lamely, looking over at her friend for help. The girl, who Sam recognized as the girl that Pippin groaned about all of the time, looked down at her feet, either too shy to speak in the presence of somebody other than her friend or too uncomfortable with Daniel's antics.

"Live like every day's a Friday," Daniel replied. Sam wondered how he got into university, but then again, after rooming with Pippin for a while, he didn't really think it was that improbable.

Daniel was still refusing to let go of Rosie's shoulder, and before Sam realized what he was doing, he had made his way down to where Rosie and Daniel were standing. Sam stared at Daniel, trying to make sure he couldn't see Rosie in his peripheral vision when he said, "Sorry Daniel, but Rosie is coming over to my room to study tonight."

He grabbed Rosie's free hand and pulled her away from the boy. Rosie's friend quickly followed suit, giving Sam a grateful smile as she brushed by them, muttering a goodbye to Rosie.

It wasn't until Sam was outside of the building when the situation sunk in. He felt a large blush appear on his cheeks as he looked down at his hand to see that Rosie's was still clamped in it. He didn't know whether he should let go or if he should keep on holding onto it. They both stood, somewhat awkwardly until Rosie gave Sam's hand a squeeze before he let her go.

"Thanks, Sam," she said, and Sam looked up at her briefly to see that her cheeks had a lovely red hue to them, much like his own. It made him feel better about himself that she actually knew his name. "So... do you... do you actually want to study?" she asked him.

Sam's eyes widened, completely flabbergasted with what she had just said. Rosie Cotton wanted to _study _with him. Rosie Cotton wanted to _spend time _with him. His heart was beating so loudly that he was sure that she could have heard it. It was when Sam realized that he couldn't spend time with her when it felt like his heart had been drop-kicked by the Hulk.

"Um... Sorry... but I have to work tonight, down at the café," he murmured, almost too quietly. He hoped that she had heard him, because he never wanted to say no to spending time with Rosie Cotton ever again. He also tried not to feel incredibly horrible as Rosie's face looked rather crest-fallen for a brief second.

She then smiled at him, revealing her two front teeth that had a little (adorable) gap between them, "Ah well... there's always a next time, right?"

Sam's stomach did backflips when he nodded, unable to speak.

"See you soon, okay?" she said, looking ready to turn away before she paused, and said, "Thank you again, for what you did. I really appreciate it. The world needs more gentlemen like you."

With that, she was off with a flash of her curly blonde hair.

Sam almost skipped to work but the knowledge that the reason why he could not be studying with Rosie at this moment was because of work stopped him. He was still in a rather light mood when he entered the bustling café. If Sam knew how to whistle, he might have been doing so as he changed into his work uniform. He had an incredibly chipper smile on his face as he got out to wait on people.

His smile was not unnoticed. Frodo looked at him with raised eyebrows as he cleaned the counter absentmindedly. "What's got you in such a good mood?"

Sam smiled before he simply said, "Rosie talked to me... and she said that we should hang out."

"I told you she liked you," Frodo told him, and Sam looked down into the tea he was steeping, a blush creeping across his cheeks yet again.

"I don't know if she likes me, Frodo, but she called me a gentleman today," Sam concluded before he swept away, carrying the tea to the person he was serving. Before he got back, there was a ringing of the bell, and Rosie's friend, AKA, the Caffeine Girl (as Pippin had dubbed her) walked in. Sam could hear Pippin's groan from where he was standing, and glared at him for being so rude.

"Why does she come here so often? How does she have enough money?" Pippin muttered more to himself than to anybody else, "If I had that much money, I'd buy all the pastries and just sit in the back and eat them after my shift."

"It's nice to know what would happen if you had money," Gimli chortled as he dumped the cookies into their proper places. Pippin, like the child he was, stuck out his tongue at the auburn haired upperclassmen, before he went to go serve the Caffeine Girl, muttering under his breath all the while. Sam was considering giving both Boromir and Pippin a talk about how muttering under their breaths was rude.

He was distracted, however, when he thought about how Rosie wanted to spend time with him. His grin reappeared on his face, and the rest of his work shift was filled with thoughts about Rosie.

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**Thanks to Gracie, Jasperslittlesister, tommyginger, Guest, wonderpanda10, Xx-Jigoku-no-Hana-xX, Rorythedragon, mngirl, ichipup, and Wanderingidealism for reviewing! Thanks to Quiet Hiker, Concha G, and Wanderingidealism for favouriting/subscribing. Thanks for reading, and please review, they are quite lovely to get. **

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**I solemnly swear that next chapter the identity of the Caffeine Girl will be revealed, so stay tuned!**

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**Sorry (yet again) for a late update. I got a terrible cold right after my concussion (my immune system is practically only there to keep me from dying of a cold, not preventing one) Also sorry for such a short chapter! Next one shall be longer (I hope.)**


	6. Addiction and Halloween

Pippin checked the cupboard; all he had left was a small box of stale rice crackers that his older sister Pimpernel had given him for his birthday. She was a fan of the gluten free diet, despite the fact that she didn't even need to get gluten free, and no matter how hard Pimpernel tried to convince him to convert to a gluten free diet, Pippin refused to do so. There were too many delicious things in the world that had gluten in them, and there was no way that he was going to stop eating them.

He supposed he should have gone food shopping, but he hadn't the time; he had been studying his hardest for his midterm, and only studied, ate and slept. He had only realized that he was running out of food when he was spooning canned diced tomatoes into his mouth as he made his sixteenth page of review notes. He would have gone shopping but now he had to go to work; after abandoning his job for a week, he was finally getting shifts again.

Hopefully for him, Legolas would have not thrown all of the stale pastries out yet. A bonus of working at the café was that Pippin could get all of the stale pastries for free, since none of the customers would want to buy them. It was pretty much what he lived on, since he was much too lazy to actually go food shopping properly. Sure, it may not have been entirely tasty (they still were pretty good), nor was it incredibly healthy, and it may have caused him to gain some weight (just a little... he hoped). It was still food, and it helped him get through the day, probably just as much as his nicotine patches did.

He was supposed to only take one a day to help get him over his addiction, but Pippin was not exactly true to the program. He was lucky that his parents helped pay for his food, but they were completely against paying for his addiction. They were quite encouraging to help him get over it, but they figured that if they didn't pay for his nicotine patches, he would get over his addiction. It was much harder than that, though. He had started smoking at the end of tenth grade, and only started the patches two years after smoking, during his first year of university.

It shamed Pippin to think that the reason for him wanting to get a job at the café was so he could afford the nicotine patches. Since he was not true to what he was supposed to do, and he used two to three patches a day instead of one a day, his addiction cost him about sixty to ninety dollars a week. It was an expense he would not be able to afford without his job.

He had tried to hide the fact that he was a nicotine addict to Gandalf when applying for the job. He purposefully did not wear a patch to the interview, or for the first couple months of work. Even so, he had a sneaking suspicion that Gandalf knew about his addiction from the moment he had applied for the job. Gandalf just seemed to know things without being told. Pippin also had a hunch that it was the only reason why he got hired.

Though Pippin was firmly against cheesy movies, and cheesy stories, he found that the longer he worked at the café, the less he relied on the nicotine patches to get him through the day. Sure, the smell of coffee reminded him of when he used to sit out on the back porch and have a cigarette with a coffee in the morning, but he found that working distracted him. The café was incredibly busy (except on rainy days). It was as cheesy as he got over his addiction; he still had a long way to go, but he found that the distraction and the support he got from his coworkers helped.

He sighed, pulling out the box of rice crackers. Despite the fact that they were months old and incredibly stale and meant that was succumbing to his sister's wishes, they were the only food in the house, and he didn't want to have to work with coffee and pastries while starving. So he grudgingly at the crackers (convincing himself that it wasn't just the stale taste that made them bad), before he grabbed his bag of work stuff.

He made sure he had his face-paint in it. Though it was only his second year working at the café he was still very much in love with the Halloween tradition, and was grateful that he went home for Thanksgiving* so he could get a costume. Though Gandalf required that they dress up during the week of Halloween, he also required that they still wear their uniform, which was why Pippin had bought himself a pair of cat ears. Not only was it an obvious enough costume, it might help him be adorable enough to get a girlfriend. Plus, bringing the face-paint would help make sure that Boromir dressed up (Pip could easily turn him into a zombie if Boromir was being a stick in the mud ). He always brought it despite the fact that Boromir might now have been working.

Sure dressing up was a little childish; it was a tradition loved by both the customers and the staff. Boromir, Aragorn and Gimli would never admit to like dressing up, but Pippin had seen Aragorn smiling as he put on a face-paint beard last year. Aragorn had denied it horribly, blushing all the while as Arwen told him that he looked nice with a beard. Pippin was hardly surprised when Aragorn began to grow a scruffy beard after that Halloween.

He entered the café, smiling at the little ghost, black cat and pumpkin stickers on the windows. All he could see on the tables were Halloween themed mugs; Gandalf had instructed them to only serve with the Halloween themed mugs, and had hidden the rest of them. Pippin had a theory that Gandalf just owned an entire storage locker of mugs, because during Christmas, he had only Christmas mugs. He then supposed that collecting mugs was a better addiction than nicotine.

He exited the change room after taking forever on his face-paint (he wanted to look incredibly awesome), the 'STAFF ONLY' door swinging behind him. He thought his face-paint was bound to be the best costume around; he thought he looked pretty snazzy until he saw Frodo.

Frodo was wearing a pair of large, circular false glasses, and through his dark curly hair, Pippin could see a red, lightning bolt 'scar' painted on his forehead. If Frodo's eyes were actually green instead of blue, Pippin would not have been surprised if people thought he was the real Harry Potter. Frodo even pulled out a red and gold striped tie. Compared to him, Pippin's face-paint and cat ears seemed like a mediocre attempt to dress up.

"Nice costume," Pippin commented as he got back behind the counter.

Frodo grinned as he made a coffee; "Bilbo insisted; I agreed. We both share a love of dressing up, though Bilbo does it more practically for his interviews and movies."

Pippin could see people in the café lift up their phones in a nonchalant fashion, obviously trying to get a picture of Frodo. Frodo did not seem to mind, though Pippin wasn't sure if Frodo even realized that they were taking pictures. Cellphone service in the café was iffy, so they all couple have been Lion Kinging their phones in an effort to send a text. Pippin then snorted at the unlikelihood of that possibility.

Pippin had yet to serve a customer when Legolas came out of the back to put a new batch of pumpkin muffins in the display case. Pippin could see false pointy ears, and a circlet was wrapped around his hairnet.

"What are you supposed to be?" Pippin demanded.

"I'm an elf!" Legolas exclaimed as if it was the most obvious thing in the universe. Pippin just shrugged, though Gimli popped out from the back, an incredibly long plastic beard strapped to his face over his real not as long but pretty impressive beard. On his back, Pippin could see a foam axe.

"And I'm a dwarf!" Gimli told him.

"You look more like a cave-dwelling Neanderthal," Legolas retorted.

"Aye, and you're a tree-shagging ninny!" Gimli yelled as Legolas walked back in the bakery, the door effectively blocking out their bickering.

Pippin raised an eyebrow to the closed door, before he saw a hand raise up. Pippin was walking towards the customer before he realized it was the Caffeine Girl. He sighed before he continued to walk over, it wasn't like he could turn back now and cower behind the counter.

"The regular?" Pippin asked before she could speak.

The girl stuttered for a little bit, before she looked down at her feet. Pippin stood there for a couple of seconds, unsure of what to do.

"A coffee with two creams, right?" He eventually said, "Or would you like something else?"

Her head shot up, "Ah... no.. Um... umm... that's good..." she looked back down at her feet, "how do you know?"

"Well, you're a regular now, so I think I should know your usual order," Pippin responded, "And your name, if you don't mind. The staff usually likes to get to know our regulars. I'm Pippin."

"I'm... um... Diamond," She replied, her cheeks turning incredibly red.

Pippin gave her a grin, "I'll be back with your order soon, Diamond."

Pippin walked back to the counter, wondering why she was so embarrassed. Perhaps she was just overly shy, and uncomfortable with talking to people... yeah... that was the one that made the most sense. Pippin had never seen her talk to anybody else in the café, and had never seen her bring a friend to it. She had to be incredibly shy or incredibly introverted.

He was fixing the coffee when he finally noticed that Aragorn was also working. The tall politics student was wearing a gladiator helmet; the kind that made it look like he was wearing a rather large curved broom on his head. Unfitting to his costume, however, was the pendant that Arwen had given him as a good luck charm. It was rather girly, in Pippin's opinion, but Pippin decided to tease Aragorn about something other than the pendant.

"That'll impress Arwen," he commented, pointing at the helmet.

"Shut up," Aragorn mumbled back.

"So are you two dating or what?" Pippin demanded.

"We're not dating. Now go give your coffee to the Caffeine Girl before she dies of withdrawal," Aragorn shot back.

"Her name's Diamond, for future reference," Pippin told him as he made to go get around the counter.

"I'll keep that in mind when I receive your wedding invitation," Aragorn retorted, and it was Pippin's turn to blush.

"We're not getting married," Pippin said, glad that his entire face was covered in face-paint. Diamond annoyed him more than anything. It wasn't like he was beginning to _enjoy _seeing her at the café every day. No. The day Pippin admitted that would be the day that Aragorn finally got enough courage to ask Arwen out on a date. Pippin had a long, _long _time before that happened. Or so he hoped.

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*Canadian Thanksgiving is in October, before Halloween; sorry for the confusion Americans.

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**Thanks to KFinance, tommyginger, Xx-Jigoku-no-Hana-xX, Adanwen, Wanderingidealism, Rorythedragon, Nyla Evergale, mngirl, LoTR-HP-PJ, BleachmyNARUTO, and Crazylily1007 for reviewing! Thanks to legolasgreenleaf14, Etolrah, Super Serious Gal 3, sarahcap27, Cee.A, and Crazylily1007 for favouriting/subscribing!**

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**Sorry for such a long wait; I was really busy with school. HAPPY (PRE) HALLOWEEN GUYS.**


	7. Muffins and Qualifications

The kitchens were always insanely hot whenever Gimli got to work. Legolas seemed to never have any classes ever, and always seemed to be in the kitchens whenever they opened. The only time Gimli had opened was when Legolas went on vacation with his father back to his hometown. Gimli had been invited, but he wasn't exactly keen on going to the Greenland Heights over his Reading Week. Gimli still very much appreciated the offer, seeing as the rest of his family lived in Scotland, and he had gone to ME University due to its esteemed engineering program.

Gimli adjusted his hairnet on his beard, wishing that today he wasn't working in the kitchens, and instead was working out waiting tables. It was, unfortunately, raining, so the amount of customers had taken a plummet. That still didn't prevent Legolas from keeping the ovens going nonstop. Gandalf did not have air conditioning in the kitchens and even though it was fall, the kitchen's three large ovens kept the room quite warm despite the fact that all the windows were opened.

Gimli used the sleeve of his shirt to wipe off the sweat before he put on his oven-mitts and pulled out a tray of muffins. Despite them lacking eggs and the chocolate part of banana chocolate chip muffins, Gimli knew from experience that they were quite good. It was a wonder that Legolas wasn't going to run his own baking company. Gimli thought that perhaps Legolas would be happier running a bakery than he would in environmental sciences.

It was at least once a week when Legolas came in with some new idea of how to make some vegan food. Gimli teased Legolas throughout the process of making the new concoction, but always found it quite satisfying whenever they worked out. When it didn't, they always seemed to manage to convince Pippin that the failed food object was actually edible, and got him to take it home. They often received comments about how they were 'traitors' and that Pippin would 'never trust them again.' And yet, Pippin would still take home whatever baked food items they offered.

Today, they were attempting to make gluten free (not entirely vegan) double chocolate chip muffins. So far, they at least smelt good, though there had been many a failure that had done the same. Legolas often told him that they would never learn if there wasn't failure, but Gimli thought it would at least save Gandalf some money. Gandalf, however, seemed to enjoy the fact that the vegan and the near carnivore were willing to work together.

Gimli decided that the muffins were cool enough to take out of the tray, and then put them into the basket for Legolas to bring out to for the customers to eat.

"Hippy, bring the baked good out," Gimli commented, "I'm sure they're running low out there."

"It's raining out, there would be nobody there, halfwit," Legolas retorted.

"Go anyways, I'm getting tired of your presence," Gimli muttered.

"I'll go then, I need to breathe some air that doesn't smell like you," Legolas told him, sweeping the basket into his arms and turning to leave into the serving part of the café.

There was certainly a large amount of teasing between the two. Everybody knew that it was only that; teasing, but strangers often thought that Legolas and Gimli were going at each other's throats. People who knew them well knew better however, and Gimli was absolutely positive that Aragorn had started up the rumour that they were gay for each other. Gimli had yet to get Aragorn to admit it, but ever since he came up with the conspiracy that Aragorn had started that rumour, he had teased Aragorn a lot more about Arwen.

"Tell Aragorn that he should ask Arwen out!" Gimli yelled as he spooned out some muffin mix into some trays. He checked the clock in the kitchen to see that his shift was almost over. After he got back to his dorm, he was going to have to work on his assignment. His class wasn't until eight in the evening, a rather unfortunate time, seeing as it made Gimli always sleep later on Wednesdays which was quite unfortunate due to the fact that he had an eight o'clock morning class on Thursdays.

He put the trays into the muffin oven, before he began to check on the cookies. Legolas was a firm believer against timers, which made Gimli paranoid to the fact that he might burn the cookies. He shook his head; since when was he, a stout, bulky engineer who played football in high school, concerned with the state of cookies. He supposed it was due to the fact that there was a pay check attached to the wellness of the cookies, and the fact that there were many customers who would rather not eat burnt cookies.

The cookies where unburned, though on the more crispy side than what Gimli would have liked them to be. He supposed his time bickering with his friend wasn't exactly spent productively, and he could have taken them out then. But, he would never miss an opportunity to make fun of his friend, especially when his shift was almost up and all of his time outside work was spent studying.

Gimli wondered why he wanted to be an engineer in the first place. All the exams were harder than a normal degree, he had to deal with Physics and Math on a daily basis (he did like math, however), and he had more exams than normal students. He liked engineering, however, which meant that he had a method to his madness.

Legolas had returned in time for his shift to be up. Gimli finished scraping off the cookies and then bid Legolas goodbye, "I hope the rest of the day isn't as slow as this," he said, as he took off his apron, and folded it in his hands.

"The rain seemed to be lightening up, and more people seem to be showing up. Your help would be appreciated," Legolas told him.

"Don't try to guilt me into another shift like you did last weekend, I actually have to work on this project and I have to finish it tonight, it's due at eight thirty," Gimli replied, raising his eyebrows at his friend's fake pout. Legolas gave Gimli a small smile in return.

"You could have finished it before today," Legolas commented, and Gimli glared at him, "If you didn't procrastinate so often, you wouldn't have to rush."

"Thank you, mum," Gimli retorted with a huff, throwing his apron at Legolas's head. Unfortunately for Gimli, the apron unfolded in mid-flight, and it fell quite a few metres short. Legolas raised his eyebrows at him, though Gimli was absolutely positive that Legolas would have stuck his tongue out if Aragorn had not walked into the doors. Legolas liked to keep his composure around anybody but Gimli. Legolas said it was because Gimli simply 'rubbed him the wrong way', but Gimli just thought it was because nobody else could see them in the bakery, allowing Legolas to be as childish as he wanted without reprimanding.

"So, Legolas? You wanted me to help with the baking?" Aragorn asked as Gimli walked over to retrieve his failed missile.

"You were the only one qualified," Legolas responded as he began to mix up the pumpkin muffin recipe. Gimli knew that the only reason why Legolas was making pumpkin muffins was because they had left over pumpkin from Halloween (the firework show didn't attract as much people this year due to the constant, dreary rain), and Legolas wanted to use it all up.

"Qualified?" Aragorn said, putting his hair in a hairnet.

"Pippin would eat all the food, Boromir's bound to burn anything he touches, and you know that Frodo gets caught up in his thoughts too much, he'd lose track of time," Gimli explained, and Aragorn's face wore the expression of remembering one too many pots of Kraft Dinner lighting themselves on fire due to Boromir's horrible cooking.

"Makes sense," Aragorn agreed, "What of Sam?"

"Sam likes to be where Frodo is," Legolas put in, "Plus, I hear Arwen loves the pumpkin muffins. You could bring her out one fresh from the oven!" Legolas almost sing-songed, waving the bowl of pumpkin muffin mix around. Gimli snorted as Aragorn's face turned red, looking down at his toes and grumbling something to himself. Gimli could still see that Aragorn was wearing the necklace that Arwen had gotten him.

"Well, I'll be off, then," Gimli said to them with a small salute, backing through the kitchen doors. Legolas had been right; the café was much more occupied than it had been when Gimli had first shown up for his shift. He tried to not feel guilty about leaving Legolas in the bakery with Aragorn; sure Aragorn was qualified, but it didn't mean that he was qualified with high honours. Pippin often took home a lot of baked goods whenever Aragorn entered the kitchen.

Gimli disappeared into the 'STAFF ONLY' door to get changed into more street appropriate clothing. Once he was changed, he purchased one of the freshly made vegan banana muffins (employee discount!) and made his way out of the café.

The rain had nearly stopped when Gimli got outside. Only a few, tiny but still incredibly chilly rain drops hit Gimli as he made his way back to his dorm, munching on his muffin as he went. There were very few people on the street, few enough for Gimli to notice the people who did not seem to belong there.

The large red 'M' surrounded by fire made it quite obvious, but the flaming eyeball (what a shitty mascot, really) on the front of their sweaters solidified Gimli's suspicion. But it did not exactly quench the curiosity of why nine, extremely sketchy looking Mordor College students were doing wandering around the campus of the city's university when their school was halfway across town.

The leader of the group, Gimli supposed, judging on the fact that he was wearing the most eyeliner, gave almost a small hiss as Gimli walked by him. Gimli gave him a rather uncomfortable glance, before he shoved the rest of his muffin into his mouth and began to walk as fast as he could back to his dorm, occasionally checking over his shoulder to see if they were following him.

Fortunately, for him, they weren't. But that still didn't mean they weren't up to no good.

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**Thanks to Nyla Evergale, Gracie, LoTR-HP-PJ, tommyginger, Rorythedragon, KFinance, Singing Moon, Guest, Xx-Jigoku-no-Hana-xX, and Quiet Hiker for reviewing! Thanks to PurpledragoN1997, and NTSFroes for favouriting/subscribing! Thanks for reading and please review!**

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**Terribly sorry for such a late update; I got an ear infection and I have killer headaches, which makes it difficult to look at screens. My schedule is going to get more busy due to the fact that I have school sports! Sorry!**

**Also, I don't own Kraft Dinner. I can't even eat it.**


	8. Glass and Spray-paint

Legolas was the first person to see it. He had gotten to work early in order to open it up the store (he'd done it multiple times, seeing as he was the oldest employee and Gandalf trusted him the most). He was surprised; never had something like this been done to the café. Sure, there had been shenanigans on campus before, but the café was generally a beloved place for the students, and nobody would have ever thought to smash the windows in with rocks.

Legolas opened up the door, his jaw dropped. Glass was strewn around the room, on the tables nearest to the windows and the chairs. It was obvious that the vandals had entered the café since multiple books from the book-shelf wall had been taken out and ripped to pieces. Legolas stepped over a couple pages of a fantastically illustrated version of the Brothers Grimm fairy tales, disappointment filling his heart. He then saw the shelves that had held the mugs. A couple of the wooden shelves were broken it two; and all of the Halloween mugs, every single one of them, had been smashed on the ground. The shards of the mugs were almost like an ankle deep puddle of orange and black glass.

The first thing Legolas did was swear; a lot. He was normally a gentle person, but working in the kitchens with Gimli had taught him almost all of the swear words he knew. They all came spilling out now; cursing the vandals for ruining the books and the mugs and the café in general. He kicked an overturned chair and ran his hands through his hair. He didn't understand why he was so upset about this; perhaps because this place was the only place where the workers didn't shame him for choosing to be a vegan despite the fact that his family and almost the entire world around him was not.

The second thing he did was pick up the phone and call Gandalf.

"Hullo, Legolas," The voice said, "Having troubles opening the café?"

"Actually, I opened it just fine," Legolas replied, "But it's been vandalized. Horribly. The windows are all smashed, and the mugs. Some of the shelves are broken, and a lot of the books have been destroyed. I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry Legolas, unless you were the one who had done it," Gandalf told him, a slight chuckle to his voice. Legolas just wondered how Gandalf could manage to be able to make a joke at a time like this. "I will be over straight away. I presume you have called the police?"

"Um... not actually. I was going to," Legolas admitted, and gave a small chuckle.

"I will see you soon, Legolas," Gandalf concluded, and the phone call ended with the click of a phone (Gandalf's) being hung up.

The third thing Legolas did was call the police. He filled out all of the information that he needed to, wishing to himself that Gandalf had installed a security alarm instead of just being trusting of the students on campus to not do any harm to the café. Legolas knew that Gandalf was going to get little to no money from his insurance company; no company would accept a claim to a vandalism that happened on a building with no security alarm.

Legolas wondered what that would mean for the café. Gandalf was a long retired professor who had set up the café as a way to keep busy during his retired years. Surely it meant that Gandalf had enough money to repair the café, and hopefully get it back into business without falling into economic trouble. Legolas hoped he did; otherwise he was going to have to go back into his high school mode, something he had long hidden.

It had been a long time since Legolas had been seen making fundraisers and raising awareness about things he cared about. It was a side of him that few people he still affiliated with knew, and it was a side of him that he didn't want anybody else to know. It was quite terrifying, actually. Legolas recalled shoving pamphlets about the environment into people's hands. For some reason, they always accepted them. It was most likely due to the fact that Legolas had inherited his father's death glare and that it tended to slip up when he was determined to convince somebody that he was right.

Perhaps that was how he had won student body president in twelfth grade. It all made sense now.

Luckily for him, the death glare made no appearance as Gandalf walked in to the junked up café. If it had, Legolas would not have been surprised if Gandalf presumed that he had been the vandal.

"Well, they certainly made work of this place," Gandalf muttered, leaning down and picking up a piece of one his Halloween mugs. "Luckily they were only the Halloween mugs, and they didn't seem to steal any of the chairs or tables… or the machines."

"They came here to harm, and harm only," Legolas said softly as he opened the door to the kitchens. They were in relatively good condition apart from the black spray paint on the back wall saying 'DIE FAGGOTS.' "And they were relatively uncreative with their insults."

"I do agree with that, Legolas," Gandalf said as he inspected the nearest oven. "Please check on the change room, if you don't mind."

"Of course," Legolas nodded, and turned and left the kitchen he had spent so many hours in over the past couple of years The 'STAFF ONLY' door had been spray-painted as well, though instead of insults it was a rather poorly drawn penis. Legolas was beginning to wonder if it had been students from the nearby high school instead of students at the university or neighbouring college.

The only damage in the change room was a smashed mirror and more spray paint. There was so much spray paint that Legolas thought it would be better to repaint the wall instead of spending so much time trying to wash it off. Legolas stepped over the broken glass when he heard Gandalf call his name.

Legolas spoke to the police as a witness. He could not identify any suspects (much to his chagrin). The only thing he could really say was that it had happened after the café had closed, and that Legolas had been the first person to report the vandalism. The police seemed displeased in the fact that they had no alarm, and then told Legolas that he would be better off out of the way and thanked him for his time.

"You should tell the employees of what happened, Legolas," Gandalf said with a small sigh, "I will sort out this mess. Also, tell them not to worry about their pay, I will pay them for the hours they would have had this week, and for ten hours a week until the café is back up and running."

"Thank you, Mr. Gandalf. I hope we can sort this out soon," Legolas told him, before he whipped out his phone and made a large group text.

'The café has been vandalized to the point that we cannot work there. Gandalf says not to worry about money, he'll pay you for the hours you had this week and then for ten hours a week until the café is open for business again.'

He hadn't even taken ten steps when his phone buzzed with a text from Pippin, 'WHAAAAT? NO! DID THEY TAKE ALL THE FOOD?'

Legolas rolled his eyes; of course Pippin's main concern would be the food. 'No, they just crushed it all.'

'WHAT A WASTE!' Pippin seemed very fond of capslock, and it gave Legolas the impression that Pippin was screaming in his ear. About food. A small smile appeared on his face before his phone buzzed again.

This time, it was from Aragorn, 'Really?'

'Unfortunately so, I saw it myself,' Legolas typed back as he waited to cross the crosswalk. He waited a couple of seconds before he then sent the next text, 'It means you won't be able to see Arwen almost every day. Gives you an excuse to ask her out since your time isn't occupied by work.'

Aragorn took ten minutes to respond. It was short and sweet. 'Shut up.'

Legolas was smirking as he got back to his dorm room. Gimli was waiting for him, sitting up on the bed. The stout man's hair was ruffled from sleep, sticking up rather unattractively and childishly, but Gimli wore a stern expression on his face.

"Um… What's going on?"

"I know who did it," Gimli told him.

"You _know _who did it?" Legolas asked, almost shrilly. "Who?"

"Well, it's more of a very educated guess," Gimli admitted before he gave a small sigh, "The Mordor College kids. They were hanging around the café after work yesterday. They were wearing an unhealthy amount of eyeliner. One of them _hissed _at me."

"Just because they were wearing eyeliner doesn't mean they were the ones who vandalized the café," Legolas retorted.

"I got a bad feeling about them, Legolas," Gimli responded as he shifted back into his bed. "They gave the chills, and it was obvious that they were up to no good. Maybe it wasn't them, but they're definitely a top suspect."

Gimli threw the covers onto his head, and then muttered, "Too bad the only damn thing I could see under their hoods was their eyeliner," into his pillow, making Legolas burst out laughing.

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**Thanks to Nyla Evergale, Wanderingidealism, Daeril Ullothwen, LotR-HP-PJ, laurawesome, Raisinet, Tiarna na fainne, and XxJigoku-no-HanaxX for reviewing! Thanks to Elfwine, HMSFalcon, Daeril Ullothwen, laurawesome, and TooManyFandomsToCount13 for favouriting/subscribing. Thank you for reading, and please review!**


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